Times Writers Group: Ebola tragedy hitting home

The days when things that happened in distant parts of the world were of no consequence to people living in the United States are gone. Recent reports of Ebola killing hundreds of people in West Africa may have seemed to many in Minnesota as just another African tragedy.

I felt that way until last week. I had been in Nigeria a few weeks earlier, also feeling that Ebola was in Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea — and not Nigeria. It was not a Nigerian problem. It is easy to see problems in other parts of the world as other people’s problems and not ours.

But last week I was listening to a TV reporter talk about the Liberian man who died in Nigeria and a brief interview with his widow. He was an anonymous Liberian man, without a name to me until I saw the picture of his widow fighting back tears as she discussed her husband’s travel to his homeland and his desperate desire to return to his children in Minnesota.

The anonymous Liberian man became Patrick Sawyer, graduate of St. Mary’s in Minnesota and husband of Decontee Kofa Sawyer, my former student at St. Cloud State University.

It was no longer a West African tragedy; it was mine.

As a professor, many of my students become my lifelong “children.” Their well-being and success remain important to me. I am sure other teachers share the same feelings, especially about students with promising character.

It is a Minnesota family very dear to me grieving the loss of a husband and father. These are Minnesota children grieving the loss of their father.

The fluidity of human migration makes us much more connected than we like to accept sometimes.

The missionaries who go to distant lands to educate, treat and evangelize people of different cultures bring us together and respond to our shared needs and connectedness. They try to create a better world — one in which we are brothers and sisters, no longer strangers.

I am humbled by the reality of our shared humanity and interconnectedness when I think further about Patrick’s death, his grieving widow, the recuperating Americans Dr. Kent Brantly and Nancy Writebol, their families, their quarantined co-workers here and in Africa, and the families of the now more than 1,000 dead victims of Ebola.

Since the death of Patrick, several people who came in contact with him in Nigeria have been diagnosed with the disease, and some have died. It is easy to think of the deadly contagious disease. It is easy to grieve the loss of life and human suffering from disease.

But we must remember the contagious goodwill and generosity that unites us. It is the contagious beautiful character of Decontee that made her tragedy instantly mine. I am not alone.

As I started gather details of the tragedy, I have heard other people in St. Cloud are similarly touched and are coming together from 5-8 p.m. Thursday at the St. Cloud Public Library to support Decontee and her children.

This is the spirit on connectedness that makes us a community. I am happy people in the St. Cloud community can come together to grieve and to share in the generous gifts of this beautiful family and our shared community.

I hope that many people will come to join in celebrating and sharing the beautiful life.

This is the opinion of Dick Andzenge, a professor of criminal justice and victimology. Andzenge is an internationally recognized expert victimologist, who is a program director and lecturer for several academic courses in many countries. His column is published the second Wednesday of the month.